The volume of suspicious money flowing through casinos has been reduced significantly, so where will the province turn its attention to now?

Peter German, the former RCMP deputy commissioner that wrote the damning report on money laundering in B.C. casinos, says the province should pay attention to other vulnerable sectors, including real estate, horse racing and luxury items such as high-end cars and yachts.

“They tend to be centres that are cash driven or you can deposit cash. They may be regulated, but there’s no financial regulation in terms of financially reporting,” German said in an interview with Postmedia.

In his 247-page report, German said top officers at the Vancouver Police Department told him they were concerned “we have not scratched the surface of the money laundering which occurs in the Lower Mainland.”

The VPD told German that despite the “significant money laundering in legal casinos,” it is “a drop in the bucket” compared to what is really taking place. Police resources are focused on violent crime and immediate public safety issues, so money laundering offers “fruitful policing opportunities” as it is a portal into other homegrown organized crime activities.

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A VPD spokesman said Friday that the department couldn’t respond to questions about the comments by deadline. An RCMP spokeswoman said senior officers who could answer questions about money laundering were not available Friday.

Kash Heed, former B.C. solicitor general and former West Vancouver police chief, said the VPD executives are right.

“There are so many other areas that we don’t even come close to examining where money is laundered,” he said. “It is something that has to be looked at.”

Heed said money laundering has been on his radar since his days running the VPD’s drug unit, when the proliferation of cannabis-growing operations came with large crime organizations exchanging cash across the U.S. border.

He believes investigators have a big task ahead of them, involving probes into the stock market, property deals, apparently legitimate companies and currency exchanges. He recalled investigating one small exchange in a basement where $12 million was being shipped out each month.

B.C. Attorney General David Eby has raised the possibility of having German conduct a review of connections among organized crime, money laundering and real estate. German said they are still roughing out details.

Former solicitor general Kash Heed says Mounties need to step up their game on rooting out money-laundering.wayne Leidenfrost /
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Heed said B.C.’s municipal police forces should not be expected to conduct large-scale money-laundering investigations, which should fall to the RCMP in both their provincial and federal law-enforcement roles.

“In my opinion, the RCMP should be re-defined and this is a federal responsibility, they should have the resources to do it,” he said.

Heed said he believes the casino report is highly political and the B.C. NDP government is amplifying the issue of money laundering in casinos — only a “piece of the puzzle” — so that it can point fingers at the previous Liberal government, when the problem is much bigger.

In releasing German’s report on Wednesday, Eby said the province would be implementing his 48 recommendations that include creating an independent regulatory agency for gaming and a specialized police force to tackle crime in casinos. Eby was not available for an interview.

German noted that organized crime is already giving B.C. casinos a wide berth because of recent increased scrutiny.

While it imperative to continue scrutiny on casinos, he said it’s also important to take action in other areas, some of which have also been identified in a federal government discussion paper as areas that aren’t required to report suspicious money transactions to Fintrac, the Financial Transaction and Reports Analysis Centre of Canada.

In a written statement on Thursday, Ministry of Attorney General officials said any sector of the economy where people can make large purchases of cash is vulnerable to money laundering.

They said the province will work with the RCMP, the joint illegal gaming investigation team and municipal police departments as it determines how best to implement German’s recommendations.

Attorney General David Eby holds a copy of an independent report on money laundering, in Vancouver, BC. June 27, 2018.Nick Procaylo /
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Suspicious money transactions in B.C. casinos were just $200,000 in March, a trickle compared to the $20 million that flowed through them in July 2015.

German estimated that in excess of $100 million has been laundered through B.C. casinos. However, he acknowledged it could be much higher.

Documents obtained as part of an Postmedia investigation show that $650 million in suspicious transactions flowed through B.C. casinos between 2010 and 2016, two-thirds of its in $20 bills.

Simon Fraser University criminologist Robert Gordon welcomed German’s recommendations on tightening up scrutiny of money laundering in the casino sector as long overdue.

However, Gordon said he didn’t believe there was any way that volume of money that could potentially be laundered through casinos could be laundered in areas such as luxury vehicles. There could be money laundering in real estate, he suggested.

Gordon said it’s also possible that some organized crime elements would choose to go to another jurisdiction rather than try to launder money in B.C. in a more regulated environment.

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